


You All Meet In A Cell

by icarus_chained



Category: Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work
Genre: Adventuring Party, Crimes & Criminals, Dungeons & Dragons Inspired, Dwarves, Fantasy, Gen, Half-Orcs - Freeform, Humans, Original Fiction, Prison, Tieflings, You All Meet In A Cell, altercations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-15
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2020-06-29 05:48:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19823809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: "His new cell mates arrived during Soren's forty-seventh rendition of 'Water in the Dust', sung Redcliff-style with the rhythmic underpinning. He wasn't sure if that counted as an annoyance or a reprieve. Although, from the looks of them, he wasn't leaning towards 'reprieve'."A potential adventuring party meets in a cell. Well, most of them. Two of them met earlier, and not in friendly fashion.





	1. Introductions

**Author's Note:**

> Again, a vaguely D&D inspired quick thing.

His new cell mates arrived during Soren’s forty-seventh rendition of ‘Water in the Dust’, sung Redcliff-style with the rhythmic underpinning. One that was going quite well, if he didn’t say so himself. He wasn’t sure if his guests counted as an annoyance or a reprieve, therefore.

Though, from first impressions, he wasn’t particularly leaning towards ‘reprieve’.

The first body through the door was a _body_. Limp, unresponsive. Soren presumed unconscious, rather than actually dead, because the local guards didn’t usually make that sort of mistake on a first meeting. It was a dwarf, either way. A rather grubby, distressed looking dwarf, it had to be said. Definitely an unsavoury sort, though the shock of white at the temple of a snarled black head of hair did lend the slightest air of mystique. 

The second figure through the door was a tiefling. An _awake_ one, with a dark spot through the shirt along one side that looked like blood, and a bit of a snarl on her face to go with it. Which rather caught up the bulk of Soren’s suddenly rather wary attention.

She spun around angrily as they shoved her through. Not the sort of anger of _intent_ , really, more generalised aggravation, but it didn’t endear her either way. The guard, Marlas from the looks of him, not the friendliest sort at the best of times, slammed the door heavily in her face with all malice aforethought. The slam of the bolt sliding home and the harsh jangle of the locks sounded particularly emphatic, too.

Oh yes. She hadn’t been making any friends around here. Not at all.

She turned slowly, shoving a hand through her hair in aggravation, aiming with the ease of long practice to rasp perfectly between her ear and the base of one spiralling black horn. She was a bit of a stunner; he could admit idly to himself. Five foot ten or eleven if she was an inch, built to match, and the horns another good foot and a half on top of it. Skin as black as the horns, a fall of white hair, and eyes an intriguing gold. Definitely an exotic sort of beauty, if a bit burly for many tastes.

Now if only she wasn’t planning to kill anyone today. Such as, for a random example, the flimsy human sharing her cell. Or, he supposed, the unconscious dwarf either, though if they were involved in the same incident, she may have already vented her spleen in that regard. She looked the sort of person who could render a man unconscious. No matter how hard his skull.

Or at least, she did _initially_. First impressions, sort of a thing. Once she’d settled down a little and paced away from the door, she started sounding like something else.

“Well this is a fine mess!” she muttered to herself, pacing fitfully, her hands fluttering agitatedly in front of her. “This is going to look so good in the letters! Sorry I haven’t written for a few days, Aunt Genna, I got myself arrested! Oh, that’s going to go down a treat!”

Soren’s eyebrow bumped up fractionally. Aunt Genna. What a nice and non-infernal sounding name for a letter home. Well. That was a good sign?

“Oh!” she said, snapping to a stop in her revolutions as she finally caught sight of the body. Not Soren. He was nicely tucked into the most oblique corner, behind the door, where it would take a bit of looking to spot him. But the body had been thrown in all higgledy-piggledy, and took up quite a bit of the back of the cell. He was honestly surprised she hadn’t fallen over the poor bastard already. Though she’d watched them pitch the guy in, so probably she knew to avoid it.

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected her to do once she remembered her slumbering companion’s presence, but dropping to her knees and fluttering her hands anxiously around the dwarf’s head hadn’t really been it. She hissed between her teeth, and sort of pulled the body around until he was lying more-or-less comfortably. Or would be, once he woke up enough to appreciate it. She muttered angrily under her breath at whatever wound was decorating the dwarf’s head.

“Oh, I’m really sorry! I’m so sorry. I haven’t even got a canteen to clean it. I swear I didn’t mean to hit you that hard! You just startled me, that’s all. Whatever you hit me with hurt like a bitch, it was just instinct! Uncle Redfoot does that, hits you out of the blue, and you’ve got to be on your toes, you’ve got to hit back before he gets you in the knee or something. I didn’t mean to wallop you, I swear …”

Soren coughed quietly at that one. Oopsie-daisy, sure. Could happen to anyone. She turned, though. At the sound. She turned and finally caught sight of him. 

He didn’t cringe. Much. Smooth, that was him. Smooth as silk, absolutely.

“I, ah,” he started, while she stared at him in startlement. “I don’t think he’s much able to answer right now. Or much in the mood to appreciate excuses either, maybe.”

She … blinked. Mostly. Staring at him, then back down at the dwarf heaped beside her knees. Then back at him, this time a lot more sheepishly.

“It really was an accident,” she said, scratching sheepishly at her neck. “He bumped into me, got startled or something, and _hit_ me. Some sort of bolt of force or magic or something. He looked a bit wild-eyed; I have to say. And I had my quarterstaff, and it was just … instinct. You know? I really didn’t mean to hit him that hard. And then they all showed up and arrested us, and they’ve taken all my water and my bandages, and I can’t even help!”

Soren stared at her some more. Just for a second. And then he rubbed at his own neck and heaved himself carefully to his feet. Slow and steady. Let’s not startle anybody. She didn’t stand up herself, he noticed. She didn’t respond to his movement. Just kept kneeling there, between him and the body, happy as a clam to be staring up at him. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He scooped up the little tin cup of water that graced the cell, though, and wandered cautiously closer to her.

“They tend to do that in prisons,” he said, gingerly extending the cup in her direction, pulling his hand back rapidly when she took it. “Take your things, I mean. You, ah. You might want to prop him up or put him over on his side. If you hit him in the head, he’ll probably want to throw up when he wakes up, and that’s very unpleasant if you’re on your back.”

She winced at the reminder, and grimaced knowingly. “Yeah,” she murmured, and looked around for a second for a safe place to put the water while she attended that. “Yeah, I remember that. That’s why you don’t give Uncle Redfoot a chance to get up high. You wake up seeing stars.”

She’d wedged the poor dwarf over on his side by this point. He really was out for the count. Or pretending, possibly, but Soren had some experience of playing possum and he wasn’t getting that impression here. The dwarf was out of it. If this was her _not_ meaning to hit you very hard, he didn’t think he’d like to see her actually aiming for it. He’d seen a man with his skull caved in once. Back in Redcliff, on the chain gangs. Rockfall. It had been … It’d taken them a while to get the rest of them out of the debris and uncoupled from the corpse. It hadn’t been a very pleasant few hours.

“I don’t think it’s a good sign that he’s been unconscious this long,” he murmured, tucking his hands behind his back where she wouldn’t see his worrying fingers. Not that she was looking, exactly. She’d started clearing the dwarf’s hair away from the goose egg on his temple, patting gently around it with damp fingers. 

“No,” she agreed, a thread of temper slipping back into her tone. “And those arseholes didn’t help either. I don’t know which of us they thought was to blame, but they arrested me for attacking him. What the hell were they thinking, throwing him in here with me without so much as a glance! What if I _had_ been attacking him? He’s defenceless like this. What if I’d decided to finish the job? Do they just sort of throw you in here, and whichever one survives, that was the guilty one?”

Her voice cracked on the end, there, a thin, hard edge of incredulity and disapproval. Deeply offended, apparently. Ferociously upset by the thought. Oh dear. 

“More or less,” he said softly, half reaching towards her before catching himself and swaying hastily back out of range. “It’s as quick a method as any. The thing you have to learn about Ashford is, they’re not all that keen on … truth and justice, as it were. They just want to keep the peace. Throw all the troublemakers in a hole and … let them sort themselves out. That sort of thing.”

Or ship them off to Redcliff. That was usually _after_ the initial testing phase, though. Want to make sure you’ve really got the nasty ones before you send them off there. Or just the wily ones, who managed not to get themselves killed inside the first few nights. Real tough nuts, those ones. Better send them off right away.

He wasn’t bitter at all. No sir. Not a bit of it, your Honour.

She shot a look at him, there. Almost like she could hear the thoughts. Such deep, offended horror. Oh, that was painful. That was too much, really it was. 

You’re going to get eaten down here, my dear. Tough and all as you are, devil’s spawn or no. 

They’re going to eat you alive.

There was a noise down the hall before he had to vocalise any of that, though. Fortunately. It wasn’t the sort of thing he enjoyed explaining. Mostly because anyone who _needed_ it explained generally wasn’t going to last very long. Dreary conversations, those. He’d take most any excuse to avoid them.

Even if in this case the excuse in question looked to be guest number three.

It was Marlas in the lead again, looking even more disgruntled than the last time. Sporting a new bruise, too, a lovely shiner taking up most of the left side of his face. The perfect match to the absolutely bloodthirsty snarl coating the rest of it. Well then. Looked like they’d found someone even more objectionable than …

He didn’t actually know her name, he realised. The tiefling. As nice a conversation as they’d been having, they’d never quite gotten around to introductions, had they?

Might have to wait a bit, though. The newest occupant of their little slice of paradise got shoved forwards into the light, almost dragging one of the guards after her, and Soren began to deeply regret his decision to move earlier. He was caught in the centre of the cell, now, right between the unconscious dwarf, the still-kneeling tiefling, and their newest friend. Oh, bad position. Such a bad position. But moving didn’t look like the best of plans just yet. Let the guards move off again first. Avoid drawing attention until you’ve got the number of potential combatants down as far as possible.

Not that it took long, really. Marlas took one last chance to hawk and spit a gob right at the latest visitor, going a little green at the absolutely _terrifying_ noise she made in response, and then slammed the door with all of his considerable body weight behind it. Soren could hear scuffling as he kept himself wedged against it while the other guards juggled with locks and bars, like he thought she might throw herself at it in an attempt to get back out. Or back at him. From the short lunge she made across the cell, he figured that for once Marlas mightn’t be all the way wrong.

It was a bad idea to try a half-orc’s temper. Didn’t they say that?

Half-orc or … possibly even full orc? It was really quite hard to tell. He’d never seen a woman as burly, not even Glissa Listersen, and there were unkind rumours about her parentage as well. This one was … Well. Let’s say she favoured the less human side of her ancestry, shall we? The tusks were something else, and the scowl was absolutely fit to go along with them. 

The clothes … were a little odd, though …

“Are you all right?” the tiefling piped up, looking not the least perturbed by this newest entrant into their conversation. She was still kneeling, he noted, glancing down at her. She’d brought one leg up, though. Just in case she _had_ to get up. Honestly, it was more than he’d expected from her, given the conversation thus far. And the one still going, as well.

“What?” the … on the balance of probability, the _half_ -orc growled sharply. Spinning to glare at them. And then pausing, quite probably at the sight they made. They were … a more than slightly odd collection of beings, Soren had to allow. A flinching human, an unconscious dwarf, and a kneeling tiefling. Quite a collection, yes indeed. Enough to give even orcs pause mid-rampage.

And pause she did. All the way. She reared back, as if physically checking herself, and then shook her head as if casting her temper away. Her chest heaved, and then shuddered, drawing in air through her nose to force herself to calm down. It was a struggle, looked like, but she grabbed her temper by the throat and shoved it down with all speed. Quite an operation to watch.

“I said, are you all right?” the tiefling repeated, standing up and moving towards her while this was going on. Soren stepped smartly to the side as she passed, grabbing the opportunity to get out of the line of fire with both hands. The tiefling ignored him, or at least seemed to ignore him, approaching the other woman with open, solicitous hands. “They’re not very kind around here. Are you hurt any?”

The half-orc raised an eyebrow. An extremely _eloquent_ eyebrow, her mouth twisting around her tusks in a truly speaking sort of expression. “ _Not kind_ ,” she repeated, and barked a laugh like someone throwing up a boulder. “You’re telling _me_ they’re not kind! Cowardly, murdering _sons of bitches_. I should have ripped his spleen out through his oesophagus, the sanctimonious little toe-rag! But!” She held up a clawed hand. “But! Not here, not now. I’m fine, thank you. My bloody _patients_ aren’t, in fact he’s probably killed several of them, but _I’m_ perfectly fine. How are you!?”

… Absolutely fine, Soren thought distantly. Absolutely, perfectly fine, in light of that little speech. What an informative sort of rant. ‘Patients’. Informative and interesting, yes.

He’d _thought_ the clothes were odd. The bits they’d let her keep. Not that he imagined there’d been too much more to take off her. Just the over-robe, probably. And the amulet. The red-string belt. No wonder she wasn’t happy.

They’d been cracking down on itinerant preachers lately. Preachers, healers. Rabble-rousing in the name of the gods, and all that sort of thing. Disrupting the peace. Helping people who would be better off left to learn the consequences of their actions. Or existence, as the case may be. The burghers and the watch had been developing a particular distaste for the devotees of the Broken and Shining Gods lately. Healing the sick and the crippled, the poor and the outcast. Encouraging all the wrong sorts of people, in short. Terribly un-civic-minded of them.

Not that he’d have pictured a _half-orc_ as filling either of those roles, but appearances could be deceiving. He knew that better than most, or _should_ do, anyway.

Present company certainly drove the point home, after all.

“I’m just fine,” the tiefling said, smiling slightly and completely ignoring the red stain at her side. Which, to be fair, she’d been doing since she walked in. It clearly wasn’t bothering her that much. It had been the dwarf she’d been worried about. And speaking of … “Although, if you’re a doctor or a healer, and if you’re sure you’re fine … We’ve been a bit concerned about our friend here?”

She gestured back towards the limp form at Soren’s feet. Drawing attention back to Soren as well in the process, but a handy skip back out of the way mostly took care of that. The half-orc didn’t so much as look at him, beyond a quick, jaundiced eye to judge if he was a threat or not. Her focus swung back to the two clearly injured companions, and then mostly the dwarf. On the grounds, presumably, that he was bad enough off to not be up and talking.

“What happened to him?” she grunted, striding forward and dropping down into a crouch beside the body. Soren sidestepped away even further, though he didn’t go too far. It was oddly fascinating, watching her great, clawed hands delicately lift the dwarf’s head and turn it gently from side to side. “He’s got a fine goose egg here all right. One of those bastard’s clock him throwing him in, did they?”

“Er,” said the tiefling. Shuffling on her feet when the half-orc cast the jaundiced eye _her_ way. “Not exactly? I mean, it was me. I sort of happened to him. But I really didn’t mean to hit him that hard. And I’m sort of worried that he hasn’t woken up yet, because it’s been a _while_. This happened in the street, and he hasn’t woken up the entire time we’ve been in here.”

Which was definitely a bad sign when it came to head injuries. A general ‘may not wake up ever again’ sort of sign. Soren had seen _that_ too. A cellmate in Redcliff had gotten too smart one day. Made himself a real enemy, got himself beaten more than half-way to death. He’d seemed fine for a bit. Bloodied, torn up, but he’d been talking. Complaining. Then he’d gone to sleep, or passed out, and just … not woken up. Not _died_ , not immediately, but not woken up. And after a day and a half they’d just … written him off. _Finished_ him off. Said a cursory service and dumped his body in the prisoners’ graveyard.

He hadn’t been thinking about it, standing here waiting for the dwarf to wake up. Not really. Not so’s you’d notice or anything. Honest.

The half-orc made a concerned sound, leaning down to examine the dwarf more closely. Lifting his eyelids, peering at his pupils. Testing his pulse and his breathing. They were normal. Well, the breathing anyway. Soren had been listening for it. Looked like the pulse couldn’t have been too far off either, because she frowned but didn’t start twitching.

“We’ve bathed the wound,” he heard himself offering, distantly. Wincing, when they both looked at him. “Or, I mean, _she_ bathed the wound. Turned him over. Didn’t sound like there was an obstruction or anything. He was breathing fine.”

The half-orc looked at him, but thankfully didn’t comment much. She frowned down at the head in her hands, and carefully palpitated the area around the wound. “Can’t feel anything sagging or leaking,” she murmured absently. “No blood in the eyes. Doesn’t seem like he’s bleeding in there. Best not take chances, though. I’ve got a bit of juice left, if nobody minds me using it on him?”

Apparently, nobody minded.

It was always fascinating, watching a caster work. The movements of the hand, the words --a prayer, by the sounds of it-- under the breath. The changes in the body underneath the hands. Lumps shrinking, wounds receding. Flesh healing back over. The hair was still sticky with dried blood, of course. The dirt and the filth remaining in place. It was just the skin beneath it that changed.

He’d been half-expecting the dwarf to startle upwards. Maybe even hoping, if only to avoid treading any further into an echo of Davin’s death. Some quick, overt sign of waking. He’d sort of been hoping. But for the first few minutes, there was nothing.

The half-orc wasn’t fussed, though. She didn’t seem perturbed. He had to hope that was a hopeful sign.

“… Odd profession to take up,” he heard himself say. Wishing, idly, that his mouth would ask permission of his brain more often before it did things like this. “For a—Um. Well …”

“For a half-orc?” she asked, looking up at him. Too gravelly to be sweetly, but the intention was there. Soren flinched, and shuffled back a few more steps. The tiefling half-moved, glancing between them like she wanted to … get between them? Possibly? No point there, though. If there was one thing Soren had learned in Redcliff, it was that if your mouth got you in the hole, it was up to you to get yourself back out.

“Yeah,” he said, straightening up just a touch. Nothing to do but brazen it through. For given values of ‘brazen’, anyway. “Sorry. You’re just not what most picture when it comes to a cleric, is all. Not of the Broken God, anyway. There’s just the image of them, you know? Gentle, sad … murdered. A lot of the time murdered. You seem a bit …”

“Hard to murder?” she asked again, but differently now. More pleased, in a dark, cynical sort of way. He nodded ruefully, and she bared her tusks in what was probably meant to be a smile. “I’ll take that as the compliment you may or may not have intended it to be.” She sneered, and then calmed herself again. Then grabbed her temper by the neck once more. “My mother was a midwife. My _human_ mother. She worked hard, and helped out a lot of people who wouldn’t have been helped otherwise. Seemed good to do right by her. And the Broken God always seemed like someone I could get behind. So. Here we are, hmm?”

There was challenge in that. All the world of it. But if it came to it … Soren supposed he didn’t necessarily disagree. Doing right by people. Standing up for someone you could believe in. Wasn’t anything _wrong_ with the idea. Just a matter of getting the world to cooperate, was all. If you could manage to work it like that … more power to you, he supposed.

He sighed, rubbing a hand down his face tiredly. “Here we are,” he agreed. “Sorry. My mouth’s been making decisions without the input of my brain a lot lately. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

And not _just_ because it didn’t look remotely safe to do so, either.

She looked at him for a long minute. The tiefling too, eyeing him curiously from the side. It was the half-orc who spoke up first, though. Heaving herself up out of her crouch, looking him over while she wiped her hands down on her tired undershirt. After a minute, it seemed he’d passed muster enough for her to hold her hand. Her massive, clawed hand. Soren thought about it for a very long second before he reached out and put his own hand in it. Getting your hands crushed wasn’t fun. A lot of things weren’t fun, really. She curled her hand around his as delicately as she’d cradled the dwarf’s head, though. No crushing for now.

“Ghelarta Khnor,” she grunted, shaking his hand lightly. “Cleric of Ilmater, as you seem to have guessed. From Highwater originally, but we go where the need is, and Ashford is a shithole in direst need right now. Don’t know if you’ve noticed.”

Soren snorted harshly. Swallowed back a cackle, the bright, bitter laughter threatening to spill from him far too easily. He shook his head.

“Ashford’s been a shithole for a long time,” he managed, trying _very hard_ not to think about Redcliff and all the people who’d wound up there over the years, for really pathetic reasons. Not even him, he’d at least actually been committing crimes when he’d been sent down, even if not wholly willingly, but there’d been others … At least he’d actually been a criminal of sorts. You couldn’t say that for all, or even most, who wound up breaking rocks down there. All thanks to Ashford, and its clarion commitment to keeping the _fucking peace_.

Ashford was a shithole, all right. The world’s _prime example_.

“… I’m Relwyn,” another voice cut in, interrupting his increasingly dark musings. Rather thankfully, he thought, regaining his hand and realising with vague alarm that he’d been clutching the half-- _Ghelarta’s_ hand rather unwisely tightly for a few seconds there. He blinked, and turned to the tiefling. Who was standing there, watching them, something strange and soft in her expression. He blinked at her, and she smiled at him. “If we’re introducing ourselves? Relwyn Garrick, at your service! Or you can call me Tanglehorn. Most of the monastery call me that, if they aren’t calling me something else.”

“… Monastery?” Ghelarta asked, at almost exactly the same moment Soren muttered “Relwyn? That’s a gnomish name, isn’t it?” The words tangled together, and they glanced at each other grumpily. Still. It was a fair question, he supposed. And as a cleric it made sense it’d be the one she asked first. Fair enough.

Relwyn just beamed at them, apparently not at all perturbed by multiple tangled questions from two directions at once. Which, if it _was_ a gnomish name, might make sense as well.

“It is gnomish, yes,” she agreed happily. “My family are gnomes. Well, most of them. Adoptive, of course. I’m from the All-Gods Monastery in Rhyl. Left in a basket on the doorstep sort of deal. They all decided to look after me. Gave me gnomish names and everything. They taught me infernal, though. Aunt Sourtongue knew it, not sure how, and they wanted me to have a bit of my heritage, you know? I’m training to be a monk. I’m on my pilgrimage right now. You know, go out and learn new things? Bring your experience back? Like that. I’ve been out for about a year now.”

Which was … All right then. Soren wasn’t entirely sure what to do with that, but fair enough.

“I’m sure you’re learning all sorts right now,” he murmured ruefully, and sucked in a bit of a breath when she beamed at him again. Oh dear. She really was quite a stunner, once you were relatively sure she wasn’t going to kill you. Not fair. Not at all.

“Oh, I am,” she said, looking between them. Looking down at the dwarf still snoozing on the floor below them, a hint of something dark coming back into her expression. “I’m learning a _lot_. Not quite sure how I’m going to put most of it in a letter, but I am learning a lot right now.”

Soren swallowed softly. “Yeah,” he said. “Ashford’s good for that sort of lesson. Might have warned you. If, you know, I hadn’t already been in the jail ahead of you.”

For several years or so, though admittedly not for this particular bout. Only a few days, this time around. Still didn’t put him in the best place to warn people. Not until long _after_ they’d really need it.

“Hmm.” Ghelarta hummed thoughtfully beside him. He winced, and half-glanced at her. “Been in here a while, have you? Got a fair bit of experience with Ashford’s shitty side?”

Soren looked away. Back over at the nice _safe_ corner of the cell. “You could say that,” he said, trying to swallow the bitterness back off his tongue, before putting on a light, rueful smile to look at them properly. “Soren Martensen, at your service. Bard trainee and, more recently, career criminal. Wonderful to make your acquaintance.”

Relwyn didn’t look like she knew what to do with that. _Ghelarta_ looked like she knew all too well. She raised a thick, scarred eyebrow at him, and snorted with a complete lack of concern. 

“Right. Well, Mr Career Criminal, I’m going to need somebody to help me shift sleeping beauty down here over to the back of the cell. It’s coming on for night, and I don’t know about you, but I could use some rest sometime soon. Punching sanctimonious arseholes and getting arrested for it really takes it out of a woman. All right?”

That was the second time she’d mentioned that. Soren was beginning to wonder exactly _which_ sanctimonious arsehole she’d taken such clear exception to. Ashford wasn’t exactly short of them, granted, but judging from the speed and force with which they’d dragged her in here, by the spit Marlas had put in her eye, it was beginning to look like she’d picked someone the watch would get quite upset over. Someone really _worth_ punching, in other words.

Not that it mattered, really. He couldn’t exactly stand her a drink either way. Might be interesting to know, though …

“… That … won’t be necessary,” a voice rasped up from the floor, handily interrupting any and all musings on any of their parts. All three of them snapped around, Soren not at all ashamed to admit that he’d jumped a bit and skittered backwards in the process, and stared at what had very recently been a crumpled heap on the floor.

The dwarf glared warily up at them, squinting slightly around the aftereffects of the goose egg, his black eyes about as hard and wild as Relwyn had said. Particularly when looking at her, Soren noticed. It would seem their recently-sleeping beauty more than remembered who’d knocked him out for the count.

Not that you’d _forget_ , Soren supposed, but yes. The dwarf knew who’d hit him, all right.

Though he had hit her first. Relwyn said that, and on the hour or so’s acquaintance so far, Soren was rather inclined to believe her. Which made this fellow the aggressor in the picture, and quite possibly still dangerous, even if he was still white as a sheet and seemed mostly uninclined to try climbing to his feet and slinging any spells any time soon.

Though, given that the first thing Relwyn did once she’d caught up with the situation was swoop over and kneel at the bastard’s feet in delighted contrition, maybe he wouldn’t _have_ to put in that much effort. For _Griper’s sake_.

“You’re awake!” she carolled happily. “Oh, I was so worried. I didn’t think I’d hit you that hard, and I was so afraid I’d really hurt you! I’m so sorry! Are you all right? You’ve been unconscious for such a long time!”

… Maybe not _that_ long a time, Soren thought, squinting thoughtfully at the man. Oh, before Ghelarta’d put his head back together, definitely, but maybe _not_ since then. He hadn’t been watching, distracted by other things, but if ever there was a moment for playing possum, it’d be waking up in a strange cell surrounded by arguing people. Soren would certainly lie still in those circumstances. On the days when he had sense, anyway. Possibly their newly-awakened friend had been listening for more than just a couple of seconds.

Not that it mattered, really. All the lead-up time in the world didn’t really prepare you for the experience of a six-foot midnight black tiefling kneeling at your feet, still showing the blood from where you’d hit her, grabbing your hands and staring down at you in concern.

The dwarf blinked at her. A _lot_. And then glanced warily at the rest of them.

“… Right,” he said, slowly and _very_ carefully. “Well. I hit first, so I guess it’s fair. And I’m not dead, so there’s that. Where are we? And who the fuck are you lot?”

Soren’s eyebrows took a hike towards his hairline. He also swayed back a bit, moved slowly and casually to get his back to a wall. _That_ sounded like more familiar ground for an Ashford jail cell. Abrupt, wary, and potentially about to get violent. Yes indeed.

Ghelarta glanced at him. Him, not the angry dwarf. Soren twitched a bit at the look in her eye. She didn’t say anything, though. Just shifted slightly in front of him. Just changed her weight slightly so that whatever erupted would have to go through her to get to him.

Like that wasn’t _worse_.

“We’re your cellmates, obviously,” she growled, every inch the disgruntled half-orc once more. Squaring her shoulders with cheerful malice while she grinned tuskily down at him. “Well, technically we’re all _Soren’s_ cellmates. He was here first. Relwyn you know, of course, at least enough to have shot at her. I’m Ghelarta. The woman who put your head back together. Don’t rush to thank me or anything.”

Soren turtled his neck down into his shoulders. Oh dear. How very glad he was that it wasn’t his mouth who’d gotten him down the hole this time. Never try the tempers of half-orcs. They really did say that.

Though the dwarf seemed more briefly shamed than afraid at it. He flinched, a twitch backwards of shame, and grimaced angrily at himself. His hands dropped into his lap, and he took that judgement on the chin.

“Right,” he said again. “Right. That’s fair. Sorry. That’s fair. I … Thank you. Sorry.”

Relwyn, beside him, reached out carefully and touched his hands. He flinched again, this time startled and on the edge of violent, and she didn’t as much as flinch. She took one of his hands and gripped it gently.

“Are you all right?” she asked again. “You were scared. Back there, when you attacked me. You turned to me and saw something and you were scared. Is something hunting you? Are you all right?”

He stared at her for a long second. A _very_ long second, while that thought seemed to percolate through his head.

And then he _laughed_. The sort of laugh that had Soren flinching all the way back against the wall. The sort of cracked, hysterical laughing that only ever boded bad things. The worst nights in Redcliff, the sounds echoing up from the baked solitary cells at the base of the quarry. If you found yourself sharing a cell with someone who started laughing like that, you needed to get _out_. Or, failing that, as with most occasions in a _prison cell_ , you needed to make yourself as small as humanly possible and avoid drawing any attention to yourself.

If you were lucky, they’d only turn on themselves. If you were _lucky_.

Relwyn didn’t know any of that. Well, obviously. The girl was fresh out of a monastery, no-one had _told_ her any of it. She didn’t lean away, she leaned _in_ , and Soren’s body suddenly decided to start taking cues from his mouth and started moving without his brain’s leave. Moving towards them, moving towards the threat. What on _earth_ \--

But Ghelarta got there first. She got there before any of them. She leaned down, and gripped the dwarf _gently_ , so very gently, around the shoulders. One massive hand apiece. She squeezed gently. Reassuringly. Guided him back against her leg. And the laughter stopped. The laughter cut out, and the dwarf sagged all the way back against her.

“Hold steady,” she murmured, again softly. Again, so gently. “Hold onto your soul and your strength, or you’ve got nothing at all. Easy now. Hold on.”

He laughed again. Only a short burst this time. Only a sob.

“That’s the problem, I’m afraid,” he rasped giddily. “Holding onto the soul. That’s the _problem_.”

… Ah. Well then. A burst of magic he’d hit Relwyn with. A burst of force or magic. And someone was out there, hunting his soul. That … that boded well, didn’t it. That boded _so well_.

“… I’m sorry I hit you,” he managed finally. The dwarf. He looked up at Relwyn while he said it. She was still holding his hand. The silly idiot had never let go of it. “I didn’t mean to either. You just … You look like … I’ve been running quite a while. I’m sorry I hurt you.”

Relwyn smiled at him. “It’s all right,” she said. “I already told you, it’s no worse than Uncle Redfoot sometimes. Though, actually, I think you were unconscious for that part. Anyway. Doesn’t matter. Point is, you didn’t do any really bad damage. I’m pretty sure I clobbered you worse.”

Soren snorted. He’d drifted close. Almost to Relwyn’s shoulder. Again, without his own leave, but it was too late now. He touched lightly on her shoulder. Just a darting touch, for the smallest of seconds. “You can say that again,” he murmured. “Do me a favour and please don’t hit me by accident, will you? I don’t think I’ve as hard a skull as a dwarf.”

He worried, briefly, that it was too much. That she’d take it badly. She just smiled up at him, though.

“I’ll do my best,” she promised easily. “Just … maybe stay back a bit when waking me. I’m not my best in the morning. Throw a pebble at me from across the cell or something. All right?”

Soren chanced a small grin himself. “I’ll make a note,” he said agreeably. Well, they’d be sharing a cell for at least a few days, probably. Unless Ghelarta really _had_ hit someone important. It was good information to know.

“… I don’t think I’ve a hard enough head either,” the dwarf interrupted quietly. Eyeing them a little warily, his hands twitching in his lap. Like he wanted to tug them free of her grasp, but wasn’t sure he should dare. “If you can avoid hitting me as well, I’d appreciate it. I know I deserved it this time, but in future …”

Relwyn grinned. “I will try to avoid hitting the fragile menfolk, not to worry,” she said. “I’m sure Ghelarta will do her best as well.”

Ghelarta’s expression said she agreed to no such thing. “Absolutely,” she said, in a tone that said _not at all_. “So long as the fragile menfolk don’t get any unfortunate ideas into their heads.”

Soren looked down at the dwarf, who looked sharply and panickily back. “I think the menfolk will agree to that,” he murmured ruefully. “I’m sure they’ve all had more than adequate illustration of the consequences otherwise. Hmm?”

“Right,” the dwarf nodded. Forcefully, and probably rather painfully. “No hitting. In general, no hitting. I’ll try not to panic in my sleep.”

He flinched, a bit, and Soren did too. Right. He knew about that. Quite well. It hadn’t been a problem for him in a while. He had more than enough experience keeping his terrors to himself in the close confines of cells. Not everyone managed to be unobtrusive, though. It did sometimes end badly.

Having a healer around might help. If they got to keep her for any length of time, anyway.

“We’ll sort that out later,” said healer growled impatiently. She jostled the dwarf gently, almost reprovingly. “We’re stuck in a small space, I’m sure we’ll all have time to get used to each other’s peccadillos before those arseholes outside finally see fit to get things sorted. For the moment, introductions. Then I’d like to get some sleep.”

Intro—Oh, right. The dwarf. Sleeping beauty hadn’t said his name yet. For some reason, in current company, it was oddly easy to forget little details like that.

The dwarf hesitated. For a long second, enough that both Soren and Ghelarta squinted thoughtfully at him. A man with something to hide, then. Well, _obviously_ , but something connected to his name as well as whatever ancient evil had laid a hunter’s mark on his soul. A criminal, then? Someone with a mark on his name. 

Not one from anywhere within the environs of Ashford, though. When he finally deigned to give it to them, assuming it was the real name, it wasn’t anything Soren recognised.

“Adrick Silverpalm,” he said grudgingly. “I’m from … Well. Out the Felspar Mountains way. Doesn’t matter much anymore. Nice to meet you. Nice to be _conscious_ to meet you.”

Which, pointed, but Relwyn could be neatly pointed back. “Whose fault was that?” she asked smartly, but softened it a second later. “It is nice to meet you, though. Properly, and not just your head introducing itself to my quarterstaff. Relwyn Garrick. I’m not sure if you were awake enough to hear that.”

He was, Soren suspected. Given that he’d tried to follow the form of their earlier introductions, he had been very much awake and playing possum. But there was no point drawing attention to it, and no harming playing along with it. 

“Soren Martensen,” he said in his turn, nodding down at the man.

“And I’m Ghelarta, to round us out,” the half-orc finished gruffly. “Ghelarta Khnor, Cleric of Ilmater, and desperately in need of some sleep. If no-one minds and no-one’s going to die in the next half hour, I hope you’ll all excuse me while I take a nap.”

 _Even if_ somebody minds, went the unspoken rider. Not even Relwyn was foolish enough to take her up on it. Everyone nodded hastily, and shuffled their separate ways. Soren back to his original corner, Adrick scooting painfully over against the back wall, Relwyn propping herself into the corner opposite Soren’s, and Ghelarta easing herself down and stretching out along the centre of the floor. They were lucky they were in one of the bigger cells. Well, for given values of ‘luck’. It was, as Relwyn noted, more of a way to sort out the guilty from the less-guilty as rapidly and decisively as possible than anything intended for comfort. It was handy now, though. Four people, only just acquainted with each other, was far too many and far too risky for any smaller space.

They’d not do well in Redcliff, anyway. It was a heavy thought. Soren was heading back there. Both Marlas and Commander Aerton had informed him of that. One of the usual suspects, no place else for him. And Ghelarta was probably heading with him. Depending on who she’d punched, and how much of them she’d left intact to kick up stink afterwards. The administration around here didn’t give two shits about gods. Her holy sign wouldn’t have protected her, even if they’d let her keep it. Especially when she was a _half-orc_. They’d have shipped her out on that alone.

And he greatly suspected that Relwyn would have the exact same luck, and for the exact same reason. Redcliff would be _quite_ the experience to put in her letters. They did occasionally let people write them. Even more occasionally let them _send_ them. He supposed the monastery might get its knowledge one way or the other.

He wondered if they’d want it. All things considered.

But you never know, he thought forcefully to himself! You never know! Something might happen. Anything might happen. The jail might go on fire in the night, get them all out scot free. That could happen. Surely stranger things had.

No point thinking about it now, though. No point going for rendition forty-eight of ‘Water in the Dust’ either. He didn’t think present company would appreciate it. So, sleep. Ghelarta had the right of it. At this point, might as well sleep.

The number of nightmares in one cell, he suspected they’d soon enough be in short supply of it.


	2. Jailbreak

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which all the little legal sadisms of an Ashford jail cell are explored, threats and petty cruelties are enacted, and patience rather explosively runs out in the face of them. Soren isn't having a good week. To be fair, neither is anyone else.

You could learn a lot about a person from being stuck in a cell with them for a decent amount of time. Well. Depended on the person, maybe. Soren had been stuck in some cells with people, and the only things he’d learned about them were that they were very dangerous, very angry, and did not take attempts at conversation well. Which, to be fair, was an important thing to know about someone when you were going to be stuck with them for several weeks. Or years.

He hadn’t always had the best of luck with cellmates. Even the ones that didn’t die.

His current crop of companions were … slightly more talkative than many. Relwyn alone was a _lot_ more talkative than many. Something of a side effect of being raised by gnomes, he suspected. Ghelarta, too, though more taciturn than their tiefling companion, could be relied upon to interject a short, pithy opinion fairly regularly. Not a woman to be caught behind the door when there were truths to be stated as bluntly and unequivocally as possible, that one. Soren had found himself catching a laugh behind his sleeve more than once. Somewhat to his horror, because that could _definitely_ end badly if the wrong person caught you at it. Ghelarta only snorted at him, though, looking half-pleased, so it probably wasn’t that lethal in current company.

They were definitely one of the odder groups he’d been stuck with. Honestly, about the only one around Ashford or Redcliff’s normal speed of cellmate was the dwarf.

And that … to be fair, that wasn’t entirely his fault. He hadn’t started _out_ acting like some of Redcliff’s more dangerous cellmates. He’d actually been relatively personable the first day or two. A bit uneasy around the edges, the amiable mask creaking a bit at times, but more or less friendly and easy-going. His little meltdown when he first woke up seemed to have gotten at least some of his temper out of his system, and the dwarf underneath the panicky ‘hit first and ask questions never’ first impression wasn’t that bad of conversationalist.

But that was the first day or two. Most people could manage a couple of days. The problem with a jail cell was, you were stuck there. In current company. Until whoever had locked you in felt like letting you out again.

Ashford wasn’t prone to letting people out again. That … sometimes took a day or two to sink in.

Soren had been doing his best to keep them calm. Distracted. They were new to this, all three of them. Well. Possibly not the dwarf. ‘Adrick Silverpalm’ had the air of someone who might have run afoul of the law before. But that was before whatever had turned him into such a panicky, violent mess. And it hadn’t been _Ashford’s_ law. Ashford had a few … peccadillos that even old hands might need a little work to prepare for. 

They were going to get around to it soon. Marlas had been shockingly patient so far, actually. Though maybe he was just bemused that, between a half-orc and a tiefling, violence hadn’t already erupted long since. Going by first impressions of both of them, and the dwarf too to be honest, he should have opened the food hatch to a bloodbath not even the next morning. Relwyn and Adrick had already tried to kill each other once, at least by all appearances, and Ghelarta should _not_ have been a calming influence on anyone. The fact that the (single) cup of water and (single) bowl of slop had been shoved in to the tune of four sets of snores and/or grumbles had probably come as something of a shock.

Though the tense silence when everyone woke up enough to _realise_ that there was only one cup and one bowl had probably reassured him mightily. 

Ghelarta had spoken first. Never behind the door, that woman. Never one to keep from speaking her mind. There had been a whole _world_ of rage pressed and throttled in her voice.

“Are they serious?” she asked. Carefully, _carefully_ flat. Soren flinched in his corner.

“Redcliff’s getting crowded these days,” he offered softly. Lacing his hands together on his knees. “Even with … Even with the turnover once you get there. They’ve got to whittle the numbers down somehow.”

Usually the guilty sorted themselves out. No effort required. Throw them all in a cell and see who survived. But sometimes prisoners got stubborn. Or sneaky. Cowards who tried to talk their way out of things. Sometimes Marlas and his ilk did have to … chivvy things along a bit. Put a few stresses on people. See who snapped.

Also, Marlas didn’t like Soren. At all. Some of the other guards could take him or leave him, but Marlas … held a grudge. And Marlas almost always got his way. There’d been a reason or two why they’d thrown such a lovely collection of companions into _his_ cell.

It must have been so confusing for them when it didn’t almost instantly result in anyone’s death.

The sound Ghelarta made, it certainly _sounded_ like someone’s imminent death. He’d watched her throttle back her temper once already. Judging by the amount of time and measured breathing required, this took more effort to strangle down.

Soren did wonder how her god felt about her apparent rage issues. Clerics of Ilmater were supposed to be softer than this, he thought. More hapless, more pained. Soaking up suffering so other people didn’t have to. Ghelarta looked more the sort to _inflict_ suffering. On the _deserving_ , yes, he had no doubt about that, but still. She seemed a lot more … robust. And temperamental. Than the standard image suggested.

She could still heal, though. So obviously Ilmater was at least somewhat okay with righteous rage.

“… Will there be any more later?” she asked tightly. Dangerously. Soren huddled further. 

“Of course,” he said, around a tight chest and a bitter, bitter smile. “Two meals a day. Municipal law. They just … forget to mention that it’s per _cell_ , not per prisoner. I think, ah. Commander Aerton has informed me that the statute doesn’t actually clarify, so it’s a legitimate interpretation of the … of the law ...”

Stop _talking_ , he hissed silently at himself, when her expression grew only more thunderous. Yes, it was nice to vent, but her temper had nowhere to go right now except back in this room. Lots of people liked to kill messengers. It wasn’t rare.

It was also most of the _point_ of this little interpretation of legal code. The least he could do was not hurry it along.

Fortunately, he apparently had some help with that. Relwyn pushed herself up off the floor in her corner of the room, sat up stiffly and blearily, and reached over to rest a calming hand on Ghelarta’s shoulder. The half-orc started slightly, swung her head around, but softened almost immediately. Not that Soren blamed her. Relwyn smiling hesitantly at you probably wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to resist. He imagined, anyway.

“Nothing much we can do about it from in here,” the tiefling pointed out, sleep-rough and with admirable pragmatism. “I guess we’ll just have to split what we have. Two now and two later? If we’re sure there’ll be more coming?”

She looked at Soren here. Questioning. He nodded tiredly.

“It’ll come,” he sighed, leaning back against the wall. “For now, anyway. They’ll stick to the letter of the law as much as possible, unless one of the burghers starts getting impatient. Then they might blur the lines a little bit.”

It’d take a while to get to that, though. Marlas, and Aerton above him, prided themselves on an array of entirely legal little sadisms. And if all came to all, they’d just ship all four of them out. Redcliff would deal with them, one way or another. There shouldn’t be any need to do anything … blatant. 

Barring, of course, the interference of whoever Ghelarta had assaulted. _That_ could get sticky.

Wasn’t the point now, though. He was fairly sure they had a couple of days at least before they got to that. Relwyn, eyeing him, apparently caught that. She nodded easily at him.

“All right,” she said. “So. Two for breakfast, two for dinner? Anyone got lots?”

Soren snorted faintly. Well, there probably were some odd scraps of straw lying around somewhere. Or there was always the playground route of Roshambo. Wouldn’t be the usual means of sorting this out in an Ashford jail cell, though.

Still … “How about wounded first?” he offered softly. “Or worst hit and healer, maybe?” He smiled lopsidedly at Ghelarta. “Sorry, my dear, I’m not sure how much healing takes out of clerics.”

She squinted at him. Possibly for the ‘my dear’. When he stayed bland-faced, though, she just huffed, and waved that aside. 

“Nothing sleep didn’t cure,” she growled. “Hurt first is a good plan. Body needs something to work with. Relwyn and Adrick, then. And while we’re on the topic, I want a look at that injury to your side, Relwyn. I only had enough juice for one last night, but I can give it a once-over now.”

Relwyn fluttered a hand cheerfully. “Nah,” she grinned. “It should be fine by now. Just feels like scrapes and bruising. Not sure what you hit me with, Adrick, but the aftermath feels a bit like getting slammed by one of Aunt Sourtongue’s saps.”

… Right then. Between ‘Aunt Sourtongue’ and ‘Uncle Redfoot’, Soren was beginning to wonder just how violent a family she had. Weren’t monasteries supposed to be peaceful?

Adrick seemed equally uncertain. He eyed her uneasily, and shook his head. “Can’t speak for the comparison,” he rasped, shuffling himself up to sitting. “Or for what I hit you with, honestly. It’s, ah. It’s a bit of a new thing. New feature. Not sure I like it, really.”

Another of those slightly hair-raising laughs. A giddy, despairing creak. Oh dear.

Ghelarta reached out and cuffed him gently in the head. “Grab your sanity in your fist for a second,” she grumped casually. “We’ll get to that. For now, focus on food and injuries. How’s your head?”

Adrick stared at her. “… Better before you _slapped_ it?” he managed. Bemusedly. “Should you be hitting someone with a head injury?”

She snorted. “I barely ruffled your hair. And? Any wobbly vision? Any feeling like your brain went swimming for a bit?”

Adrick stared some more. “… No?”

“Excellent.” She smiled at him, all tusks. “Just to be sure, though, we’ll go along with Soren. I don’t suppose you’ve any objections to eating first? And Relwyn, I _will_ be looking at it. Even just to check for infection. These cells aren’t the cleanest in the world, after all.”

Adrick opened his mouth, and closed it again. Relwyn grinned.

“All right,” she agreed easily. “I’m pretty good at telling when it comes to that, but I don’t mind if you want to look at it. Will we take a sip of water all around, then, and me and Adrick will split the bowl? The water we should split four ways, I think. That’s important.”

… And nice of her. Very, very nice. Soren nodded hastily. “No objections,” he said softly.

Ghelarta glanced around the cell. An unofficial vote. Then she snorted again. “Hear hear, and passed,” she growled out. “Grab the bowl, Relwyn, and Soren can start passing the mug.”

All in all, it had been … one of the more diplomatic of Soren’s first days with a new set of cellmates. And equitable. The slop wasn’t much, it never was, but Relwyn had offered him and Ghelarta a spoonful each as well. Something to tide them over, as she put it. They’d returned the favour in the evening. It had gone … very well. Very calmly. Not bad at all, for an Ashford jail cell.

But it _was_ an Ashford jail cell. And that meant peace didn’t last.

Marlas liked to start with silence. For the first couple of days. No direct interaction from the guards. No information, no knowledge, no certainty. It didn’t do much for old hands. Soren already knew where he was going, and he knew he’d get there when he got there, and that there was nothing he could do about it. But first timers … There was no way to know what was happening, in Ashford Gaol. No one to tell you when you were getting out, _if_ you were getting out, how long you’d be stuck here. What was going to happen to you. It grated. It took a while to sink in, that you weren’t getting out and that you didn’t know anything. But then it _did_. And it _grated_. 

Add in all the little indignities. Short meals. Scarce water. Sleeping on the floor. Cold and hunger and thirst. Indignity. Taking turns to piss in a bucket. A _rarely emptied_ bucket. The lack of privacy. The risk, in practically any company but this one, of people trying to … take advantage of the lack of privacy. All of that. It piled up quickly, and wore all remnants of patience very, very thin, very, _very_ quickly.

There weren’t a lot of ways to stop the mood turning sour, after a day or two. But by the gods, Soren did try.

He’d half-thought Ghelarta might be the problem. After that first day, that surge of anger. But no. Apparently she did have a touch of her god about her. While she _did_ get increasingly angry, did greet every new half-meal a day with flaring nostrils and a longer round of breathing to calm herself down, she’d also gathered that anger closer and closer to her chest. Set her jaw, set her chin, and visibly determined to out-stubborn anyone who tried to break her. It was … Soren would have laughed at it. No one in here had the resources to out-stubborn Marlas. But his chest twinged around an unwilling surge of respect, and he never quite managed to mock. Even privately.

Relwyn … was a little bit of an issue. Not out of any malice, but just because she clearly had never been stuck in any one tiny room for this sort of length of time before. She started to get antsy around the afternoon of the first day, and stayed antsy from there on out. Jittery. She was clearly used to moving much more than the cell allowed. Four people in a room made space difficult. She tried to distract herself. She talked. A lot. It actually wasn’t that bad. She had a lot of stories, and they were about equal parts funny and interesting. But he got the distinct impression that Relwyn was one of those people who used motion to calm and ground herself, and being penned in somewhere with nowhere to move was fraying at her nerves.

They’d have squished in to try and _give_ her a bit of room, of course. Not every group would have, but this one was generally quite helpful. Unfortunately, while Soren was a skinny bit of fluff at the best of times, Ghelarta could _not_ claim the same. And even Adrick, while short, was a bit on the burly side as well. Given that floor space, not ceiling height, was their issue, that didn’t leave them with a lot of options.

And, she also … didn’t ask. He could see her _wanting_ to, sometimes, but she didn’t. Sometimes niceness really was nothing more than shooting yourself in the foot.

Adrick hadn’t shown any particularly bad signs at first. Not until later. The first day or two, he’d seemed normal enough, so long as you didn’t let him dwell too long.

So, Soren did what he always did. Every cell he’d ever been stuck in, barring those where so much as breathing wrong would have gotten him beaten a good portion of the way to death. He talked. He sang. He _entertained_. Anything to distract them. Anything to keep things from exploding. 

He gently egged Relwyn along on her stories. That was easy enough. Once he had a reasonable grasp of Ghelarta’s opinions, and her likelihood of hitting people for them, he prodded her here or there to rope her in too. He would have tried with Adrick, as well, but none of what he knew about the dwarf invited any safe conversation, so he mostly left that for the other two. Ghelarta had a knack for it. She was as blunt as the face of a hammer, and invited bluntness in return. Adrick did respond to her. Less so to Relwyn, but he did to Ghelarta.

He also asked a question or two of his own. The dwarf. Of _Soren_. The sorts of questions that made him slightly uneasy. Questions like, what are you in for? Being fair, he was the only one they didn’t know the reason for. But it was how he’d asked. Adrick _was_ an old hand, after all. Not from Ashford, of course, but from somewhere. It was Adrick who’d teased out a bit of how Soren had ended up here. This time, anyway.

In his defence, it was hard to get work as an ex-con, _particularly_ in Ashford, and particularly when you had very little in the way of reputable skills. Street-corner entertainers were as frowned on in the city as any other rabble rouser, and any chance of performing somewhere more respectable had died with his first conviction. Marlas told him that the college had disowned him. It could be a lie, of course, Marlas could easily be a sadist like that, but it could … it could equally well be the truth. Reputation was important, after all. He’d never checked. Not after his first release from Redcliff, nor any time since. He hadn’t … wanted it confirmed.

So, in the absence of any _reputable_ job, he’d turned to _less_ reputable, more prison-related skills. He’d always been good with his hands. A master with a dulcimer. It served just as well for pickpocketing. And the legacy of his first, rather more unwilling, crime spree would always be with him. He could talk his way in anywhere. No need to bother with second-storey work when you could just walk in the front door. Palm a key. Pop a latch. 

He'd never _wanted_ to be a career criminal. It was just that, once you’d started down that road at all, Ashford didn’t leave a lot of alternate career paths open.

It had been pickpocketing, this time. One step up from begging, and possibly safer, all things considered. Until you got caught, anyway, but that was the point. It was easier to hide being a pickpocket than being a beggar. And he said that, too. Deliberately. The safety relative to begging comment had gotten a harsh growl of agreement from Ghelarta, who had _distinct opinions_ on how Ashford treated its down-and-out, and that had nicely derailed and distracted the conversation onto safer paths and away from more dangerous and/or sordid ones. Like what he’d been done for the _first_ time.

He’d seen Adrick looking at him still, though. Eyeing him thoughtfully. What you’d call a _professional_ eye. Soren remembered that, from his first go around. He remembered people who looked at him like that. He flinched away from it. Historically, it tended to end badly for him.

So. Distractions and conversations and entertainment. For a day, two days, nearly three. As long as he could stretch it out. Marlas could easily go a week on this stage of proceedings. Though, given how pissed Ghelarta had made him, Soren wasn’t anticipating that much of lead-in. The guard would want them softened up either way, though. Hunger. Uncertainty. Boredom and anger. Violence. They’d probably expected more violence than this. It was Relwyn more than Soren to be thanked for that. And Ghelarta managed to be decently quelling when she was in the mood too.

But it all came to nothing in the end. Every effort at keeping the peace. Hah! A lesson, there, if only Ashford was likely to listen to it. There had never been any point trying to keep peace in this cell. Not that Soren had entirely thought there was. He wasn’t that optimistic anymore. But even still. Adrick’s … curse. Follower. Whatever it was. That was more than even he could have expected.

And there wasn’t anything that could be done to stop it, either, or mitigate the effect it had on Adrick and on them. Violence you could waylay. Anger you could throttle down. But _desperation_ …

Something was going out of its way to make Adrick desperate. Or else had just terrified him so thoroughly the first time that it didn’t need to anymore. But judging by … certain things … Soren was going to lay odds on active malice. He knew a Marlas when he saw one working. Something was going out of its way to toy with the dwarf.

It took a while to become apparent. Took a while for Adrick to let it slip. But the nightmares were hard to miss. Or full-blown night _terrors_ , on occasion. Not the first night. They’d all slept relatively solidly that one, the worries of sharing a small space with strangers aside. Not really the second night, either, although it was possible Soren had just missed the signs. The third night, though, no one with intact hearing could have missed it. The screaming was, ah …

Well. You wouldn’t miss it, put it that way. At all.

At least Marlas was probably happy. Sounds like that coming from a cell, he’d have his numbers whittled down in no time. Even if there was, disappointingly, four voices still grumbling the next morning. In rather subdued fashion, but still.

Adrick tried to … act normal after. At least that time. Maybe just because he’d spent two days talking with them like a reasonably sane and un-cursed person, and didn’t necessarily want to jettison that out of hand. Or maybe because _acting_ like a relatively sane and un-cursed person helped him _stay_ one. Either way. He did try his best, for at least a little while.

But they were all hungry. And tired. And stuck in a little stone box. And the thing in his dreams did _not_ want to let go of him.

And then the crystal arrived. Some time in the middle of the fourth night. In the middle of one of the nightmares. The worrying ones, where he was silent and writhing and unable to scream just yet. Soren didn’t see it happen. He didn’t think any of them had _seen_ it happen. But he knew for a fact that none of them had had a single item on them when they were put into this cell. Marlas, along with Gregor and Phali if they’d been on duty, were past masters at that one. Checked teeth, tongue, and a few other places as well. The crystal had not been in Adrick’s possession before then.

When they woke up that morning, it was. Lying on the floor by the dwarf’s head. A dull, greyish sparkle of a thing. Completely innocent.

The sound Adrick made when he saw it was going to prominently feature in _Soren’s_ nightmares.

Things went downhill after that. Well, they would do, really. It wasn’t the sort of thing you could easily come back from.

It was hard to share a cell with a madman. Soren had gotten the hint the first day, the first time Adrick had woken up and started laughing brokenly over the subject of souls. He’d shared cells with broken minds before. Redcliff usually broke them using more old-fashioned methods, at least as far as he _knew_ , less with eldritch-horrors-in-your-sleep, but it broke them, nonetheless. Sometimes the results were harmless. Just … unnerving. Other times, not so much.

Adrick, he thought, was shaping up towards less-than-harmless. And he was shaping up in Soren’s direction.

That was the thing. That was always the thing. There was always a weak link in the cell. Always a soft spot on the chain. Relwyn had clobbered the dwarf the last time he’d gone for her. Very emphatically. Just from looking at her, no one sane, and very few insane, would chance Ghelarta without significant backup. But then … there was Soren. There was always Soren.

He really should make more of an effort to toughen up, Soren thought tiredly. Look more intimidating. That was hard to back up, though. Being _useful_ was, if not better, at least something he had more talent for. Even if it didn’t do a lot to lower the number of threats he tended to receive on a regular basis.

He’d never … been threatened inside his own head before, though. That was a new experience.

Thing was, he really should have figured. Not the telepathic part. That was beyond reasonable expectation. But Adrick had a professional eye. He knew an old hand when he saw one. And when you were being driven by desperation, a need to get _out_ , it was someone who knew the lay of the land you went to, even if they weren’t a nice juicy soft target on top of it. It did figure.

The knowledge did _not_ help, lying there in the dark the fifth night, hearing half-desperate, half-threatening whispers in his head. Not that he didn’t feel for the guy, but …

{You have to let me out, Soren. I can’t stay here. It will _find_ me if I stay here. You know a way out. I know you know a way out. You have to _let me out_ }

Soren screwed his eyes shut. Turned over on his side, hunched his shoulders up around his ears. It didn’t _help_ any, when the bastard was talking _in his head_ , but there was a certain amount of instinct involved here. When that failed to have any appreciable effect, he did the other thing he always did. He started humming. As loudly and persistently as possible. There was the risk that one of the other two would take exception to it as well. It could wind up with a half-orc fist in his ear. But he was no damned bard, disgraced or otherwise, if he couldn’t drown out _one_ challenger in a battle of persistent aggravation.

He picked one of the more complex melodies as well. Nothing rhythmic, none of the work songs, nothing he could hum in his sleep. It had to be challenging enough to draw his attention. Had to focus his concentration enough to drown the other man out.

Adrick hissed a bitter, audible curse at him. About an hour in. And then he laughed, blackly and brokenly, and rolled over and went to sleep.

They all woke up a lot more gingerly that morning. All of them grey-faced, not just Ghelarta for a change. Soren felt almost bruised, his mind thin and stretchy with exhaustion, his shoulders a stiff, aching mass of muscle. At least no one had hit him in the night, humming or no humming. Judging by the dirty look Ghelarta sent him, it wasn’t for a lack of provocation. He ducked his head away from her. Relwyn sent him a small, soft smile in passing. A … vote of sympathy, or something of the sort. He flinched away from _that_ , too.

Adrick was the last to regain consciousness. He was breathing badly in his sleep. Harsh and laboured. Soren had a minute or two to wonder guiltily if he had … paid for his failure somehow. If the thing had taken it out on him in his sleep. Or if he was just … tired. Since he’d been getting less rest than the rest of them, whether he’d been technically asleep or not. 

He levered himself out of the land of nod eventually, though. Black eyes bloodshot, and expression papery with despair. Soren looked away hastily.

And then, to complete his morning of joy, the door rattled. Not the food hatch at the bottom, this time. The viewing hatch, at the top. Soren felt his stomach, already tight, sink all the way into his boots.

Well then. It looked like Marlas was finally moving on to step two of his ‘introduction to legal sadism’ programme.

Well. He had been rather patient, Soren supposed. But here … here was where that ended.

The shiner Ghelarta had given him had faded to a lovely collection of yellows and greens. Which, in hindsight, might have been a lot of what he’d been waiting for. Marlas did like to look his best for these occasions. Just for comparison. Nice and healthy outside the cell, usually rather bruised at best by now _inside_ the cell. Or dead. They didn’t like to leave the corpses in too long, for health reasons, but they also liked to let the reduced meals soften up the prisoners a bit before going in after them. So, you know. Things to balance. Pros and cons.

He cast a jaundiced eye over the four of them. Cataloguing injuries, Soren knew, or rather lack thereof. He did flinch a bit, when Ghelarta _beamed_ at him. A great big smile, the better to show off all her teeth. She’d been stockpiling her anger. Every tiny mistreatment, symptomatic of a much larger and more crushing system. There was a lot of malice in that grin. More than a hint of lakes of seething rage. Big metal-bound door or not, it did cause a flinch. Just a tiny hint of alarm.

That was not a good thing. That kind of defiance only made Marlas worse.

Not that it would have mattered, maybe. It quickly became obvious that the guard had come here for Ghelarta anyway. That she was his first port of call on his little tour of misery. She would have been one of the survivors regardless, even if they had given way to violence. No one was going to bet against the half-orc. She would always have been there to play with. And she’d left a mark on him. He’d clearly gotten himself all prepped to torment her first. 

“I’m surprised,” he opened, with false, practiced bonhomie. “I didn’t think a beast like you would leave any of them alive. I mean, maybe the imp, out of fellow-feeling, but I rather figured I’d come back to see the other two half-eaten by now.”

Ghelarta’s lips somehow peeled back _more_. Not ferally. There was entirely knowing, intelligent malice in her voice. “Oh, they’re not to my taste,” she said, with sugary hatred. “I like them a bit more sanctimonious for breakfast. Why don’t you come on in, and I’ll show you.”

Soren closed his eyes, and pressed himself silently back into the corner of the cell.

“… Not right now,” Marlas said mildly. Just as sweet. “Bit busy right now. We’ve been … looking into you. After your assault on Master Brom, people have been quite concerned. How something like you got into our fair city. How many other monsters might be hiding behind the robes of the Broken God. That sort of thing.” Ghelarta stifled an alarmed lunge, and he smirked. “You can imagine, I’m sure. So, we thought it would be best to go into your background. And … effects.”

Emphasis on the last word. Just enough. Soren bit his lip. Ah. This play, then. She must have … She must have had something precious. Or sentimental. Marlas was fond of that.

Soren sometimes wondered what had happened to the remnants of his old dulcimer. It had been such a fine thing. A graduation gift. The only thing of true value he’d ever owned. It was possible there’d been enough left to repair, though he doubted it would ever have sounded the same. Several of the guards did like to make money on the side, from confiscated effects. There might have been enough left to sell. Maybe.

He almost hoped not. A maimed half-life was a terrible thing, for an instrument of that calibre.

He breathed steadily. Carefully. Knowing how this was going to go, now. Knowing what Marlas was going to do. He’d seen it a few times, now. Felt it, just the once. He’d known better, afterwards, to let himself keep anything of value on him. Even ‘free’. An ex-con in Ashford was never really _free_. Best not to get attached to anything. Just in case. But Ghelarta wouldn’t have known that. None of them would have known it. They were all new to this, weren’t they. They’d come to the wrong town. They didn’t know how this was going to go.

He climbed slowly to his feet. Carefully. Eyes down. Just for a minute. Just to get ready. But he did … respect Ghelarta. Even somewhat like her. He probably owed it to her to bear witness.

Marlas held something small up to the opening. Tiny, actually. A small, brown oval, with a splash of yellow in the middle. A … a locket. A small, wooden locket, with a painted primrose on it.

Ghelarta made a _noise_.

“… Marlas,” Soren whispered. Not quite meaning to. Not exactly _wanting_ to draw attention to himself. Marlas looked his way, and he quailed all the way back against the wall. But found a hand reaching out anyway. Found himself holding up a useless, pleading palm. “ _Don’t_.”

The guard snorted coldly. Eyeing him with cynical, sneering face. He shook his head, almost in disappointment. “Still alive, Soren?” he asked mildly. “Somehow you always manage not to die. Do be quiet, though. Your betters are talking. And yes, I am counting the beast in that.”

Relwyn made a noise at that. A stunned, disapproving huff. Soren bit back a hysterical giggle. Shoved it hastily aside. It was nice of her, yes. Absolutely pointless of her. A baby insult like that was nothing, absolutely nothing. They were about to find that out. And there was no way to …

Well. There were ways. To make Marlas stop. Yes. There were options. Magic hummed on his tongue. Trapped just behind his teeth. He had _options_. But if he tried— It ended badly. No ex-con in Ashford was ever really free. It would come back around. It _always_ came back around.

No. No. Persuasion. Just words. That was the way to go.

Even that was pointless. But he was committed now. His mouth had made a decision without the input of his brain, yet again. The noise Ghelarta made. He couldn’t … It was pointless. But so was everything. And he’d already started now.

“It’s evidence, isn’t it?” he said, daring to move a little closer to the door. Breathing thinly in his panic, but speaking anyway. _Trying_ , anyway. For all the good it would do. “Won’t Brom want it? Aerton doesn’t like it when people—”

“Aerton approved it,” Marlas cut him off, flatly. Icily. Soren flinched back at the tone. Felt his heart pitch down into his stomach. “As did Brom, once he was healed enough to manage it. They both agreed, you see, that the important thing here is to … teach a lesson. Explain the consequences of disturbing the peace in our city. To say nothing of assaulting a member of the council. Now, this is only a small gesture. Redcliff, I’m sure, will take care of the rest, as it always has. But we felt, all of us, that it was important to … demonstrate our displeasure.”

Soren stared at him. Swallowed thickly. But he’d known. All along. It all depended on which burgher she’d assaulted. The thin, wobbly line of legality in Ashford never bent so much as it did when one of them was … _displeased_. He’d known all along that Ghelarta was in for the worst of it. A half-orc, who personally attacked a burgher. _Publicly_ attacked, by the sounds of it. This was never going to turn out any other way. Not unless someone did something.

He had … he had _options_. Even without his few materials, there were a couple of things he could do. He just had to get the locket. He had options. But if he used magic here, and anyone, _anyone_ remembered it …

There was nowhere to run in this city. And he really didn’t want to end up in solitary again.

He swallowed, faintly, and stepped back. Not looking at Ghelarta. Or anyone, for that matter. He had an idea what kind of expressions he’d see. But there wasn’t any choice. Cowardice or not, they didn’t … they didn’t know what the consequences would be. He did. So he … subsided. Backed off.

Ghelarta did not.

“… If you break that,” she said. Slowly. Almost dreamily. “If you harm that, I will kill you. I will suffer whatever punishment is necessary. But I _will_ kill you.”

Marlas looked at them. Both of them. Soren closed his eyes. He knew what was coming. Everyone _knew_ what was coming. That didn’t make it better when …

There was the smallest little snap. As the locket broke into two pieces. A little clink, as Marlas dropped it casually on the floor. And then a savage scraping sound, as he ground his boot deliberately over it.

And then a _crash_ , and a hoarse yell of shock, as over two hundred pounds of _enraged_ half-orc slammed headlong into the door.

Soren’s eyes flew back open, shock and terror surging through him, and he staggered back away from … from Ghelarta. Or the wall of near-mindless savagery Ghelarta had become. She’d hit the door with full force. Bounced back off it, even as it shuddered with a crack and a groan. It was solid oak. Fully solid oak, iron-bound, and boasting a bar, a deadbolt, and a lock. It still split, with a sound like a thunderclap, when she rammed it a second time. Not enough to break it. The iron bands held fast. But the wood sagged in their grasp. She staggered herself. Dropped to one knee, shaking her head in bewilderment. One arm sagged as well. Hung oddly from her shoulder. But she pushed herself back up. Ready and more than willing to go again.

Outside, somewhere beyond the door, Marlas made a terrified warble, and audibly scrambled up in a jangle of keys to bolt down the corridor towards help. 

Ghelarta, blind and livid, reared up to try and smash her way out to him again. 

Relwyn darted in front of her. _Idiotically_. Soren hissed like a kettle at her out of pure shock. But the tiefling held up both hands, bracing herself solidly in front of the door.

“ _Stop_!” she cried out, holding her hands out like she had half a hope of physically stopping the other woman. “Ghelarta! You’re hurting yourself! Stop!”

Ghelarta made a … really, really inhuman sort of noise. Soren had no idea what orcs normally sounded like, but he didn’t think even they sounded like that either. But Relwyn, as absolutely fearless and suicidal as ever, only shook her head stubbornly. Both hands still out. And moved _closer_ to her. Reaching out, until she was close enough to actually touch her. Until she gripped Ghelarta gently on her good shoulder, and somehow didn’t lose a hand for it. 

“Stop,” she said again. Gentler this time. Stunned and tearful and gentle. “Please. There’s no need to hurt yourself. You have to stop. We don’t have a lot of time, Ghelarta. You need to calm down, and come back to me now, all right?”

… A lot of time. No, Soren thought. No, they didn’t have a lot of that. They didn’t have _any_.

“They’re going to kill you,” he rasped softly. Thinly. Almost absently. Looking at the door, mostly. The sagging, splintered remnant of the door. It was holding, still. You could broadly speaking call it intact. But she’d almost rammed through it. She’d _tried_ to ram through it. That was an escape attempt. An assault attempt. Arguably a murder attempt. He had no doubt which way Marlas would argue it. She’d tried to … kill him.

She was a dangerous prisoner. Too dangerous to move. The sort that had … accidents.

They were going to kill her. For that, for Brom, for anything else that took their fancy. For being who she was. They’d kill her. And not up front. Not cleanly. Not in any way that would put them at risk. They’d just … stop feeding her. Shore up the door, shove something against the outside of it, and … forget to feed her. Or poison her, if they got impatient. Prisoners got sick. It could happen. And there was only one bowl. One mug. They weren’t just going to poison _her_.

That wasn’t … _quite_ how things normally went. Even here. It wasn’t quite how he’d hoped it would go. To the extent that he’d dared to hope for anything. But it did happen. And he supposed … He supposed things had to catch up with him eventually. _Some_ set of cellmates had to do him in sooner or later. 

He hadn’t quite anticipated this one, mind you.

He felt Adrick step silently up beside him. When he looked down at him, to his credit, the dwarf _wasn’t_ smiling. Wasn’t smug, or vicious, or cackling blackly to himself. And when he spoke, too, he had the decency to do it quietly, and seriously, and _not_ in Soren’s head.

“Well. Looks like I’m not the only one who might need a way out now, huh?”

Soren hated him, that second. Just a little bit. But the point was more than taken. There wasn’t any choice, now. Wasn’t anything else compliance could gain. They’d kill him, if they ever caught him again. Slowly, in Redcliff, in the baked cells at the bottom of the quarry, or quickly, relatively quickly, an ‘accident’ somewhere along the way. But that was neither here nor there right now. They’d passed that point. They were going to kill him _anyway_.

And them. The rest of them. Relwyn, who was ridiculously stupid and nice. Ghelarta, who was … more gentle than she looked. So much more worthy of respect.

Adrick he could probably take or leave. But the other two …

He drifted forward. Floated. A body moving without his leave. No input required. He steered gently around them, and stooped down beside the cracked, misshapen door. He felt more than saw the rest of them pause to look at him. He felt three sets of eyes on his back. He ignored them. Got down on hands and knees. Pried up the dented feeding hatch with a screech to peer outside.

They didn’t have long. Marlas would be back, with whatever guards were on, with bolts and bars and things to shove against the door. Or bash recalcitrant heads in, so they could repair it at their leisure. One or the other. They didn’t have time for him to muck around.

But if they were doing things they shouldn’t do, he had one little thing to do first.

There. The light wasn’t the best out in the corridor, but it was enough. He could see … three pieces. Large ones, anyway. There might be a few splinters lost. Brown, and a splash of yellow. And … something else? Something pale and soft, lying between them. Marlas hadn’t bothered to pick them up when he fled. Well. Why would he?

Soren hummed under his breath. Then audibly. Magic on his tongue. It had been a while. It was a somewhat strange sensation now. But comforting, almost. Like an old lullaby.

A pale, ghostly hand appeared in front of him. Outside the cell. Moving in time to his music. His throat felt oddly tight as it moved, delicate as any real hand. It gathered up the little bits of wood. The soft weft that lay between them. Brought them over, and dropped them gently into Soren’s outstretched hand. Trembling and extended on the stone floor. Where anyone could—

But! No matter. No more. They were past that point now, and most others as well.

He climbed back to his feet inside the cell. Stiff and shaking slightly. He looked down at his hand for a moment. At the shattered little locket cupped there. The soft, grey-brown lock of hair. Her mother’s, maybe? Or a lover’s? No way to know. The keepsake that had held it was well-broken. It was a tiny thing, nowhere near designed to stand up to the likes of Marlas. Even the most intact piece, almost one whole side, had a great gouge scraped through the primrose. Memories, gods knew how precious, shattered just for amusement. Just to prove a point.

_Fuck_ this fucking town anyway. He said that as a native. All the more emphatically for it. Fuck Ashford so very, very much.

He turned around. Held it, wordlessly, out to Ghelarta. His hand. Everything cupped within it. She stared at him. Wild-eyed. And then, gingerly, reached up hers. Her good arm. The great crushing, healing weight of it. And took her treasure so carefully from him.

“… I don’t know if it can be fixed,” he whispered. Remembering shattered wood and enamel and strings. “I’m sorry.”

She swallowed thickly. Cradled it close. “Not now,” she said. Whisper-growled. “I don’t have my things. My … materials. I don’t have what I need to fix it now. I— _Damn them_. Ilmater _damn_ them.”

“… Maybe later?” Relwyn tried. Her voice thick too. Crying. Easily and guilelessly. Soren half-flinched from the sight of her. “We could get our things back. Maybe we could fix it then?”

Ghelarta curled her hand into a careful fist around the locket. Shaking. Trembling with raw grief and raw rage. She was such a … such a wall of force. Only half a woman, and the rest divine force made manifest. Maybe her god was actually in _favour_ of her temper issues. Maybe it was hard not to be. She drew herself up, stood to towering, and brought her hand to her lips to press a trembling kiss to the back of it. Reverent and furious, for whatever the locket meant to her.

“I’ll need one of you to pop my shoulder back in,” she said softly. Almost casually. “If I’m taking that door the rest of the way down, I’m going to need both arms. And quickly. As you said. We don’t have a lot of time.”

Relwyn smiled at her. A shaky, teary-eyed, relieved sort of smile. “Don’t worry about that,” she said. “I’ve put shoulders back in before. Got a lot of training there. But don’t worry about the door. I’ll manage that.”

They blinked at her. Probably all of them, though it was closer to a worried squint in Adrick’s case. A few seconds later, when she breathed out, settled her weight on one leg, and pivoted with terrifying speed to slam her other foot dead-centre into the door, Soren and Ghelarta echoed him. 

The door _buckled_ , groaning outwards. Still not giving, they did make them sturdy around here, but not in any way happy with them. Relwyn pursed her lips slightly. Adjusted her stance. And slammed it once, twice, and three times more. Steadily racking up the speed each time. Until the door, with one last scream of bent metal and splintered wood, tore straight off its hinges and landed with a rather final sort of crash in the corridor.

Relwyn paused, leg still extended, as though to gauge that her job actually was done. Then she nodded slightly to herself, and smoothly completed the pivot to bring her leg back down. The rest of them _stared_ at her. A little stunned. She shrugged easily back.

Nobody moved, out in the corridor. If any guards _had_ come back, or been drawn towards the gods-awful noise of the assault, none of them made their presence known.

Soren _did not blame them_. Not remotely.

“I hope one of you knows the way out of here,” Relwyn continued, cheerfully. “I’m afraid I wasn’t paying the best attention when they dragged us in here. And I’ve no idea where they might have stashed our stuff, either. Though I suppose we could just go looking for it?”

They blinked at her a little more. Then Adrick and Ghelarta looked at _him_. Expectantly.

Right. Right. Too late to go back. Nothing left to do but make it out or die. And they’d need their equipment. As little as he’d had, like Ghelarta, there were some materials in there that would … give him some more options. A sprinkling of good, fine sand, particularly. There was one particular spell made possible by that that would help a _lot_.

But even without it. If he was … acting to his full. Finally. He did have a couple of other options himself. The ones that had gotten him _into_ this mess in the first place, all those years ago, the ones that had gotten him sent to Redcliff the first time, and therefore ones that he hadn’t used since then, but still. They were there. And there wasn’t a lot of point in not using them _now_.

He took a deep breath. And then a couple more for good measure. Fixed an image in his head. A person. A guard. One that might be on duty tonight, but that wouldn’t make that much difference. They’d still get a minute’s confusion out of it. And anyone else, they might get a whole lot more. 

He hummed another tune. An old thieves’ chant, this one. Just because it seemed fitting. A faint chill rippled over him. An illusion. A disguise. And then he looked up, into Relwyn’s wide eyes, Adrick’s squinting satisfaction, and Ghelarta’s … 

Sadness, he thought. Something like it. It made him feel very, very small. But that wasn’t the point here either.

“Stay behind me,” he said softly. Trying not to remember a younger man, some eight years younger, saying the same thing. To a much different, much less friendly group of people. Even counting Adrick. “Far enough back to let me talk them around if I can. Please try … try not to kill them. And don’t fall behind. This will only last an hour.”

That was what had sent him to Redcliff back then. One of the old crew killing someone. While he stood there, horrified. Unable to do anything. And then they’d sold him out, further down the line. By that point he’d been almost relieved. He’d thought, in some naivety, that the guards couldn’t be much worse. That even if he went to prison, at least he was away from _them_. He’d been … a very silly young man, once upon a time. 

On this one subject, he wasn’t sure his current companions would be much better. And if it came to it, he wouldn’t entirely blame them for killing their way out of here. All things considered. He’d just … like to state his preferences in advance. To avoid the memories, if nothing else.

They looked at each other again. Warily, as if somehow he was the threat here. And then they shrugged, almost in unison, and nodded.

“I’ll not kill anyone in cold blood,” Ghelarta assured slowly. Raggedly. “In anger, maybe, though I haven’t yet. But never coldly. I’m no assassin.”

Relwyn shrugged and smiled slightly. “Wasn’t ever really planning on killing anyone,” she said easily.

Adrick … shrugged amiably. With all the innocence of an old hand, and a ragged, feverish light in his eyes. He didn’t make any promises. Which was fine, Soren wouldn’t have believed them anyway. He just looked towards the doorway. Wide and inviting and waiting for them to get a move on _yesterday_. He looked back, and all the half-threatening desperation of the night before was back in his black eyes.

“Lead on,” the dwarf said softly. “All I want is a way out. What’s mine is yours in that cause. _Lead on_.”

Because there was no point waiting anymore. There was no going back. Eight years, trying to steer clear of the worst aspects of Ashford’s legal system, trying to bend and bow and not bring anything down on himself, and nothing for it now. 

Right then. One jailbreak, however ill-advised, coming right up.

Gods help them all. _Please_.


End file.
